


Rallis' Lemon

by GnohomasWitness



Category: Runescape (Video Games)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-24 05:04:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15623160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GnohomasWitness/pseuds/GnohomasWitness
Summary: Rallis the dragon lady is a natural born parent who loves to take care of all sorts of creatures. One day, while going on a walk through the mushroom forest on fossil island, she comes across a giant egg (or so it seems). The egg has no owner and so Rallis takes it upon herself to keep the egg warm until it hatches.





	Rallis' Lemon

It was a warm summer day in the mushroom forest on Fossil Island. Rallis the dragon lady walked alone along the path flanked on both sides by a variety of colourful mushrooms and flowers. She was feeling lonely and thought she’d cheer herself up with a nice walk through the forest. Fossil island had always felt nostalgic to her. As she continued to walk, the peaceful sounds of the forest were suddenly interrupted by a loud crashing sound that came from behind. Rallis turned around sharply with her claws drawn but there was nothing there. She investigated further. Rallis had no idea what made the noise, but she did manage to find something interesting. On the side of the path, next to a lifelily and two medium sized mushrooms, was a strange, football shaped object. It was bright yellow and looked rough in texture. She could have sworn it wasn’t there before.

Rallis walked up to the strange object, there was dirt piled around the sides of it, it looked like a nest of some sort. She felt it with her hand. Its yellow surface was bumpy, yet smooth. She put her ear up against it. Although very feint, there was a slight scratching sound that seemed to be coming from within. Rallis’ eyes lit up. She knew what it was! It was an egg! No question about it. Rallis looked around, concerned. The parents were nowhere to be found. The egg was cold, too cold. Someone had better do something and fast. Rallis shrugged and climbed up on top of the egg, making sure not to scratch it with her sharp talons. She decided that she would sit on the egg to keep it warm until the parents came back for it.

Rallis had been sitting on the egg for several hours now and there was no sign of it hatching. She couldn’t even feel anything moving around in it anymore. She felt her hand along the rough, yellow shell. It didn’t seem as hard as other eggshells she had seen, she felt like she could push right through it if she wanted to. But that just meant she had to be extra careful. All eggs were different, dragon eggs were smooth and white while this egg was yellow and bumpy. Rallis hoped that she wasn’t too late and that the baby inside was okay. At this rate, it seemed that the mother of the egg wasn’t going to be coming back. Rallis sighed, this baby would be born having never known its parents. She knew what that was like. Rallis remembered the day her blue dragon mother told her that she was adopted. Then her eyes lit up. She would sit on the egg until it hatched and then she would adopt the baby as her own!

Another hour passed. Rallis’ stomach growled. She missed lunch and dinner because of this egg. She sighed. Sacrifices get made for the ones we love she thought to herself. Suddenly, a drip of golden honey fell onto her snout. She tasted it, delicious. Rallis looked up and saw where it came from. There was a beehive hanging from the tip of a lifelily above her. Rallis licked her lips as she stared up at the hive. But how to get more honey from it? She looked around the forest floor. There was a small purple shell next to the egg. Rallis reached down and picked it up. She threw the shell at the hive, hoping that it would put a hole in it causing more honey to drip out. The shell hit the hive right on the mark. But instead of breaking a hole in it, the entire hive fell from the lifelily. The hive landed right in her lap. Mistake! Rallis’ brain told her. A massive swarm of angry bees rushed out from the hive and saw their destroyed home. Then they saw Rallis. The bees were on Rallis in an instant. Rallis’ eye twitched as the bees crawled and flew all around her and over her. She didn’t dare leave the egg. Rallis shut her mouth and eyes as the bees started crawling all over her face. The bees tickled as they tried to get their stingers through the dragon lady’s scales with no luck, it was all she could do to stop herself from laughing and opening her mouth. She started to feel some bees try to crawl into her ear. Rallis quickly covered her ears with her hands. Then the bees went for her nose and she covered it with her tail. Then she could barely breath. She sat there blind, deaf and half suffocating until sunset.

The angry bees got bored and left once the sun started to go down. Rallis was left alone with the egg once more. She turned to face the sunset. It was stunning. Rallis smiled as she patted the egg and thought about all the sunsets she would get to share with her baby once it hatched. She thought about how sunsets like this would remind her about this day forever and how she would tell her child all about it. Rallis almost began to tear up as she looked lovingly down at her big yellow egg. Taking care of the egg reminded her of her adopted mother and the way she would take care of her when she was little. She also thought of the druids who took her in once she left Taverly dungeon and taught her how to speak and make friends. She couldn’t wait to take her baby to meet Kaqemeex and Sanfew.

The last of the sun disappeared over the horizon and the sky went dark. Rallis had never been in the mushroom forest this late at night. She was surprised by how bright it was. A full moon shone down on her and the egg. She looked around in awe at the wonders of the forest at night. Although she couldn’t see the forest floor, many of the mushrooms and flowers gave off bright and colourful lights in the darkness. She was mesmerized by the display. Fireflies danced and played in the darkness between the fluorescent colours of the glowing mushrooms. Rallis looked up at the night sky with a grin, it was full of shimmering stars.

Rallis’ ears perked up as she heard a growling sound. She quickly turned to face the sound. It was coming from the tar swamp. It was most likely a tar monster. She shuddered as she thought of the horrors that lurked in that swamp. Rallis was thankful they never left it. Then, in the distance, Rallis heard a ferocious screech. It startled her and she almost fell of the egg. She had no idea where it came from. Fossil island could be a very dangerous place if you were unlucky. Rallis scanned her surroundings with her dragon eyes and kept her ears at the ready. More than once, she mistook a pair of fireflies in the distance for a set of eyes watching her and her egg. The ordeal was beginning to put her on edge, she couldn’t imagine how the baby was feeling inside the egg with all these scary sounds. Rallis thought back to when she was very small and how her adoptive mother used to sing to her whenever she was frightened down in Taverly dungeon.

Rallis began singing the same wyvernic tune that her mother would sing to her and her siblings. All the while, she kept her eye out for danger. The singing calmed her down, Rallis hoped it comforted her baby as well. It was a bit frustrating being unable to directly ask the baby what it wanted, but she remembered the patience her mother and the druids had for her. Rallis continued to sing.

As she sang her song, Rallis began hear another voice singing along with her. She looked around until she found a tiny lizard no bigger than her hand sitting on a mushroom beside her. It was a chubby little green thing with an brownish orange beak and matching brownish orange spikes all along its back. Rallis watched the tiny lizard and continued singing her song. The lizard smiled at Rallis and joined in. The two sang together until they were rudely interrupted.

“Yeeeee!”

Rallis looked to her other side and there, standing atop a different mushroom was a second tiny lizard. It was different than the first one, this one was bipedal. Rallis and the singing lizard both made a disappointed face at the rude little creature that had interrupted their song.

The sound of thunder echoed through the woods and both the lizards scurried off, leaving Rallis alone with the egg. Rallis looked up the sky. The starry sky was obscured by long black clouds. Another rumble came from the sky. A fat raindrop splashed off Rallis’ nose. Oh no… Rallis thought to herself. It wasn’t long before heavy rain began falling over fossil island.

Rallis was cold and wet. She shivered in the rain and wrapped her cape around herself. She hadn’t expected to be out this late and was not dressed for the occasion. Suddenly, she came to a terrifying realization and gasped. If Rallis was cold and wet, that meant that the egg was cold too! She sighed as she took off her quest cape and put it over the egg like a blanket. Then she hopped back on top of the egg and pulled her arms and tail close to her. Rallis sat atop the egg and shivered, but at least her child would be warm.

Eventually the rain stopped and the sun came up. Rallis hadn’t slept a wink. She yawned and stretched her aching back. Rallis was cold, wet, tired and miserable. She sneezed. Her once light blue scales had darkened in the cold rain, she looked more black than blue now. Her nice clothes were soaking wet and clung to her like glue, freezing cold glue. And what was worse, the egg still showed no sign of hatching. She hunched over in despair, holding her head up with her hands. The egg was never going to hatch. She failed, she was a bad mother. She took her wet cape off the egg and wrapped it around herself. The defeated dragon began to cry. Tear drops fell from her eyes and down her snout before falling onto the egg and sliding off. She sneezed again. Suddenly, Rallis’ ears perked up as she heard a familiar voice.

“Rallis! Is that you? You’re looking a tad worse for wear!” It was Brimstail the gnome wizard.

Rallis looked up and gave the gnome a depressed wave. “What are you doing out here, Brimstail?” She asked. Brimstail was wearing green shorts and a button up shirt instead of his usual robes.

Brimstail smiled. “I’m taking the boy scouts out on an archeological expedition!” The gnome wizard replied triumphantly. “Isn’t that right, boys?” He beckoned to a group of four gnome children.

“Nothing is right, everything is an interpretation!” One of the gnome children shouted back.

Brimstail laughed.

The four scouts lined up beside Brimstail. They each wore a blue cone hat, blue shorts, a blue button up shirt, a red sash with a variety of badges and a pair of hiking boots. Each of them also had a large backpack with a sleeping bag strapped to the top.

“That’s quite a large lemon you’ve found there, Rallis.” Said Brimstail.

“A lemon?” Rallis asked, looking around for whatever the gnome was talking about. “What’s a lemon?”

“The giant fruit under you, my dear!” Brimstail said. “I’ve never seen one so big!”

Rallis looked down at her egg. “No, no, you must be mistaken, this is an egg! I found it all alone in the forest so I’ve been sitting on it to keep it warm.”

Brimstail raised an eyebrow and looked over his glasses.

The gnome children listened intently, absolutely fascinated.

Rallis sniffed and tears welled up in her eyes again. “But I don’t think it survived the night with all the rain! Now it’ll never hatch!” She buried her head in her hands and she cried.

The scouts started crying too.

Brimstail ran over to comfort Rallis, he put her hand in his. “Rallis, my darling. I am quite positive you did nothing wrong!”

Rallis looked at him, sniffing and sneezing through her tears.

“Rallis, I want you to come off the lemon and speak with me.” Brimstail said calmly as he tried to help her off.

Rallis pulled away. “I can’t! It might still be alive!”

“Rallis, please, I promise you, everything will be alright.” Said Brimstail. “Come down off the lemon.”

Rallis sighed, she trusted Brimstail. She stepped off the lemon and walked with the wizard.

Meanwhile the gnome children took off their backpacks and unstrapped their sleeping bags.

“Rallis, a lemon is a citric fruit known for its sour taste and yellow colour. It’s often used in salads and cocktails. Its skin is similar in texture to a lime or an orange. When you felt that egg of yours, did it feel like an egg, or did it feel like an orange.” Explained Brimstail.

Rallis’ ears lowered as her heart began to drop. “It felt like an orange. But there can be different kinds of eggs!”

“Well yes, but that thing over there, while it seems to exhibit absolutely no properties of an egg that I have personally ever seen. However, I can tell you that, despite its size, it seems to match up perfectly with any description of a lemon one could possibly come up with.” Brimstail retorted.

As the two of them spoke, the gnome scouts wrapped their sleeping bags around the lemon and climbed up top to sit on it.

Rallis looked over at the scouts sitting on the lemon. “So, you’re saying it isn’t supposed to hatch?”

Brimstail nodded. “That’s right, I’m sorry Rallis.”

Rallis sank to the ground. All that for nothing. She would have cried but she had run out of tears.

Suddenly, one of the boy scouts ran up beside Brimstail and tugged at his sash. “Scout master! The egg is hatching!”

Rallis looked up. Behind Brimstail, the lemon was beginning to shake. The gnome children hopped off and removed the sleeping bags. Rallis ran up to the shaking lemon.

Everyone watched as something began pushing up from inside the lemon. The lemon’s skin started to stretch at the top and then began to tear. A young herbiboar burst out from the top of the lemon. Juice squirted everywhere.

Rallis squealed with joy and ran up to hug the herbiboar. “My child!” She cried.

The confused creature just went with the flow, appreciating the attention. It smiled as Rallis kissed and hugged it over and over.

Brimstail just watched, his jaw open. He didn’t know what to say. He considered looking under the lemon to see if there was a burrow underneath, but he didn’t have the heart. He watched as Rallis ran off with her new baby.

One of the gnome children tugged at Brimstail’s sash. “Scout master, what fruit do gnomes come from?”


End file.
